Athens - Thousands of police were deployed in central Athens Monday for a march commemorating the 35th anniversary of a student uprising against the military dictatorship that once ruled Greece.

More than 8,000 riot police and undercover officers will guard the streets in downtown Athens and another 2,000 in the northern Greek city of Thessaloniki.

The streets in downtown Athens have been cordoned off and shops closed early ahead of the march which in past years has been marked with violence.

Students will march from the Polytechnic University in each city to the American embassy to protest Washington's support at the time of the military junta.

Thousands of people, many of them students, entered the campus of Athens Polytechnic University to lay flowers in memory of the dozens of students who died when tanks crushed a pro-democracy uprising in 1973. (dpa)